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How to Create an External Link Using the Text Module

How to Create External Links Using a Text Module

Video Training

This lesson covers External Linking, and should only be used after completing the Internal Linking lesson. Before starting this lesson, you will want to open a browser tab with an external website loaded into that tab.

Some reasons you will have to use external links are:

  1. Links to websites outside of Cascade
  2. Links to MyPostings posts
  3. Links to the Directory
  4. Links used in an Email Builder
  5. Links to any dynamic URL (usually has a question mark ? in it)

Anything that is externally linked that should be internally linked will be returned during technical review of workflow and will slow down getting your edits published.

If you have already completed Cascade training and you have a live asset with which to work, please follow along using your real asset. If you are using this guide for practice, please always use the _playground site. Yes, it starts with an underscore. It is a test site specifically meant for practicing.

Follow these steps to learn how to create external links using the Text Module in Cascade.

Step 1

Edit Page or Draft

Find any page in Cascade you can edit. You can use the _playground site if you do not have a current page to edit. If you already had a draft saved, click the Edit button, then click the "resume editing" link to continue with your last changes. If starting a new edit, click the Edit button.

Step 2

New Line of Text

In the following example, we will add an external link to part of the text: “Do NOT use external links for any of our pages in Cascade!”

Step 3

Select Link Text

Select the portion of your text you want to have become the link text. In the example here, we use, "external links." Then, click the Insert/Edit Link icon.

Step 4

External Checkbox and Copy and Paste URL

Click the box for External. Then, select another browser tab where you have opened it to the external page you want to link to. Highlight the entire URL then right-click, and select copy. You can close that second tab now. Then click into the Link Source field, select the default text in there, then right-click and select paste.

Step 5

Target and Confirm

Because we are linking outside of our website to an external link, click the Target dropdown and select New Window. When a user clicks this link it will open a new tab in their browser to display it. Finally, click the OK button.

Feel free to continue using your current example if you wish to continue with more text module lessons.

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